To the Ancient Land
by Shadsie
Summary: After hearing a legend told by the elder of a mysterious village of horned men, the Hero of Time finds himself exploring a forgotten land that was not supposed to exist. Legend of Zelda x Shadow of the Colossus with a smattering of ICO.
1. The Village of Horned Men

_**Disclaimer and Notes:** The Legend of Zelda belongs to Nintendo and the ICO / Shadow of the Colossus set belong to Sony. _

_Two of my obsessions – an attempt to bring them together in an impossible, Alternate Universe setting. The Legend of Zelda era in this is just-post- Ocarina of Time and Majora's Mask in the chronology of that game series and this tale follows the Hero of Time. The ICO / Shadow of the Colossus chronology is post-era for both games. Spoilers apply for both the Sony and Nintendo properties. I have this story outlined and have a plan for its direction. This is a bid to create a serious crossover with respect to both game series, but the thing with crossovers is: They either turn out like peanut-butter and jelly or like peanut-butter and socks. Let's see how this one turns out, shall we? _

* * *

**TO THE ANCIENT LAND**

**A Legend of Zelda x Shadow of the Colossus Crossover Fan Fiction by Shadsie**

* * *

**Chapter One: The Village of Horned Men **

"So, wanderer, what brought you to this place?"

Link sat on a hewn log, eating a round loaf of honey-sweetened bread delicately. "Just travel," he replied. "Exploration. I have been seeking a friend I lost many years ago, though by this time, I do not expect to actually find her."

"I see," the horned man said, stroking his beard. "It is not good to have a forlorn heart. My people prize the ability to let go. We have very good reason for that."

Link was awestruck upon finding this little village out in the wilderness. There was nothing around the gathering of huts and squat buildings nestled among broken, ancient ruins from some forgotten time – just plains, a dark forest and the general wild. Almost all of the males here wore what Link had thought at first were headdresses. The Village Elder – the man he was talking to – insisted that his horns were natural.

Link watched the women of the settlement fuss over a teenaged boy with a bandaged broken horn reclining by one of the huts. Earlier today, the lad had been climbing a cliff in pursuit of berries and had fallen. The lost horn was the sole major injury, the rest of what he'd suffered were scratches and bruises. His face betrayed great pain. The horn's exposed interior bled slightly through the bandaging. Link had tried to help the boy by offering a potion, but was shooed away by a fussy mother and gray-haired ladies clucking in a language he did not understand. The Elder was the only person here who could speak Hylian with Link – and he spoke it rather well.

"Do not stare too long at our features, wanderer," the Elder added. "Your features… those pointed ears of yours… They are the only reason we trusted you enough to feed and shelter you."

"You've had Hylians here before," Link observed.

"Yes, long ago. We traded some with them and they were sensible. Had you lacked your long ears our suspicion and our swords would have been immediate, with you coming to our area unexpected and uninvited."

"How come?" Link asked innocently, "I've met all kinds of people. It's strange that I've never heard tales in Hyrule of your kind, but I have friends who are rock-folk, fish-folk, desert-warriors… all kinds of people. I find most people to be pretty decent, beneath their rough spots and their suspicions."

"We are a cursed folk," the Elder intoned.

"Come again?"

"The horns…" the old man began, "The horns are a mark of a cursed fate. Long ago, our people used to be the subjects of sacrifice. Boys the age of that poor lad you met with the headache used to serve the sole life-purpose of appeasing hungry spirits and a malevolent power. It is said that one of my ancestors was a final formal sacrifice and that he put a stop to the great power, earning himself and those that came after freedom..."

"You are free now, right?"

"It is not that simple, wanderer," the man said, holding up a hand. "Among the distant people we originally sprang from… people lacking horns and with round ears… some are still born that grow the horns. We find lads left in the forest to die, as well as the occasional baby. Our kind is not wanted, because of the curse-mark."

"How awful…." Link said, looking to the ground. "It's awful that people would do that just because of one unusual feature…"

"It is one way in which our village grows."

"I grew up as something of an outcast among my people," Link sighed. "But no one in my forest tried to kill me over it."

"You look quite standard for a Hylian."

"I wasn't raised by Hylians."

"I see."

"I find the horns quite handsome," Link said with a smile. "They make you look powerful."

"They are the legacy of an even earlier ancestor than the one who freed us. That one cursed his descendants… because he could not let go."

"Hmmm, interesting," Link said with another bite of his bread. "I do wonder just how people would gain horns."

"It is a long tale, but we are before a campfire and the night is young. Twilight has just begun to fall and you have your dinner. From what I know of Hylians, your people are lovers of legends."

The Elder began a story about a land that lay just beyond the mountains to the west of the wasteland. Link paid attention to the vague directions. It was no place he'd ever been. The indicated mountains were said to be impassible.

"The Wanderer brought he body there because that land held the power to resurrect the dead…"

"Hold on a moment," Link interrupted. "Did he know about fairies?"

"Fairies? Of what do you speak, young man?"

"Fairies. In Hyrule, there are tiny magical creatures with the power to give life in certain circumstances."

The Elder's eyes widened. "Are your people immortal?" he asked.

"No," Link said, shaking his blond head. "They only work under certain conditions and can only bring someone back from death if they've just taken a fatal blow. It feels weird to be revived by one, trust me."

"The ancestor's beloved took a terrible wound," the Elder continued, "and she was dead for many hours before her lover was able to take action."

"It would be in the hands of the deities and the great powers then," Link admitted. "Go on."

The Elder described an ancient being that oversaw the passage of souls from life to death. He spoke of a land of giants, a place filled with beings that were as mountains that guarded the secret to bringing a soul back.

By the end of the legend, Link was weeping. He wiped his face on a sleeve and tried to hide his sniffling. "Is all of this really true?" he asked.

"We call it a legend, but the evidence is in our horns. It is said that the entities of shadow scattered and became one with their accursed land again, leaving only the horns and our bad fortune upon the mortal world."

"I have an unbelievable tale, too," Link offered. "You've told me a wonderful story. Now, I owe you one."

"We have not yet worn the night down," the Elder answered. "Oh, my…"

Around both the Elder and Link were gathered other villagers, including the boy with the broken horn – recovered enough to sit up and listen to stories.

"It looks like I shall have to do some translating," the old man said, smiling warmly.

"I can speak pretty well with my hands," Link said, gesticulating. He made his audience laugh as he stood and swung a harmless air-sword.

"My tale definitely really happened," the Hylian began. "I know because I lived it. You will find very little evidence for it if you go to Hyrule, though. Part of it takes place in another land that is very difficult to get to. All of it involves time-travel… lots and lots of time-travel…"

* * *

Link took his leave in the morning, having rested little and reeking of campfire-smoke. He was expected back at Hyrule Castle shortly. He couldn't take too much time off from his position as captain of the Hylian Knights, even in peacetime.

Although he would make good on his promise to keep the location of the village a secret, he could not wait to tell his Lady Zelda about the Bull-Men of the Wildwaste.

* * *

_**The wanderer rides on… **_


	2. To the Ancient Land

**TO THE ANCIENT LAND**

**Chapter Two: To the Ancient Land **

No Golden Age is truly golden, even in a kingdom blessed by ancient goddesses, such as Hyrule was. The wise leadership of Queen Zelda after her father before her gave much prosperity to the land; however, there was dissent here and there. There were always people who thought they could do a better job of ruling or that the kingdom would prosper by ceasing to be a kingdom and instead held under a different form of government. Some said that angry spirits remained in the land from the last civil war. Certainly, monsters remained in the land and they wished to shed sacred blood to bring back the tyrant Ganondorf from the place to which he had been banished - for he was their master. Without him, they were like wolves without an alpha.

It was these that Lady Zelda and her personal knight were caught by in the field outside of Castletown. A group of lizalfos, dinoflos and stalfos ambushed them when they were on a walk – upon a date, actually, despite what some in the court had been whispering about "conflicts of interest." Zelda carried a bow and had felled a few of their attackers, but they were many and well-armed. The field around him was littered with bones, blood and lizards'-tails by the time that Link took the blow that finally felled him.

He lay in the rust-scented grass, closing his eyes against the sun's harsh light when he heard footsteps and voices.

"Lady Zelda!"

"Captain Link! Is he…is he alive?"

"There's movement…"

"Hurry! He's dying. The captain is dying…"

* * *

Memories came as a river's flow. There was Zelda in the garden as a child - soft, sweet, giving him a surprised look. He stood before her and she asked him the status of the quest to fetch the Spiritual Stones she'd set him upon. He spoke to her a strange tale of a strange time. She noticed that he did not have his fairy with him. The things he spoke of in this time and this life were things he should not and could not have known.

All the same, it took Impa, of all people, to help them convince the king that the man from the desert presented a danger. Zelda's caretaker didn't remember the time-outside-of-time, but she did see visions through the practice of her shadow-magic and had practiced a truth-spell on Link. She assured Zelda's father that the lad from the forest was speaking the truth. Further proof came when Link demonstrated his sword-skills. They were the kind that would be envied by the most skilled of knights and sword masters.

The child was embarrassed when little Zelda brought him before her father and asked "Can we keep him?" as though he were a pet. Her words had come from a kind place. As she came to know his story, she learned that her alternate self had done him a great disservice by sending him back to this time. Link may have regained years of his life that had once been lost, but he was without a home. With the knowledge of his nature as a Hylian, he could not live among the Kokiri, for he was at the age of growing up.

He'd stayed for a while before feeling the urge to search for his lost fairy-friend. For the people he'd grown up among, a fairy-guardian was like a mother. Link no longer needed a guardian, but he wanted to make sure she was healthy and happy – to see her just once more. His journey led him to a land he'd rather forget and could not – for he remembered that place with every nightmare he had since. He was never happy to see a full moon bright in the sky again.

There were memories of living at Hyrule Castle – in his own chambers. He was given an education, tutored by Impa and other teachers that took care of Zelda. Zelda, herself, spent days with him in the library teaching him how to read. He "trained" under the castle knights in the arts of combat, though, in reality, he taught them. He was appointed Captain. He fought local monsters and guided people through dangers that were mundane compared to the times and tales that only he knew. He was well-respected by Hyrule's people, although he did not carry the title of "Hero of Time" in his second life and was unable to convey all of the lessons of that life to anyone he knew.

All he really cared about was that he was with Lady Zelda.

* * *

The pain hit him first. His body ached. His sides, his arms, his legs and his stomach throbbed. He grunted and opened his eyes to a gray world. A hand touched his hair and his cheek.

"You're awake." Impa's voice. "We were unsure if you would awaken."

"WharmI?" Link inquired - his tongue dry and unable to wrap itself around coherent words. As his eyes adjusted, he saw faces with empty eyes lining one wall. His mask-collection – he was in his own chambers.

Impa helped him to prop himself up. The young man yelped as his stomach lurched, feeling like it had just been shot through with fire. His Sheikah caretaker put a cup of water to his lips.

"Don't drink too fast… little sips. You'll hurt your stomach if you gulp it down."

"What happened?" Link asked as she took the cup from him.

"You were attacked," Impa said blandly. "You destroyed all of the attackers, but you took dire wounds. I stayed here, with you – in case you woke up, or in case you expired."

"Lizards…" Link gulped, gritting his teeth. "Monsters… the walking dead… I got 'em all, right?"

"Yes, you did. Zelda, too."

Link hadn't noticed before, but Impa's were incredibly sad – sadder than red eyes like hers should ever be.

"Zelda!" Link exclaimed before hissing in pain with sudden movement. "She was… she was hurt! And I… Impa, where is she?"

Impa looked at him very seriously. "She is resting in state."

"Resting in state?"

Link took a moment to process the words. At the moment, his mind was fuzzy. He felt like the world around him was made of syrup. He really did not understand what his friend and semi-mentor meant.

"You destroyed the assassins," Impa said, "but as mightily as you tried, you failed to protect her."

Link shook his head. "No, no, no, no, no, no!"

"I am sorry. The Council is discussing possible successors to the throne. There are… cousins among the nobility. Some have even named you – if you live. You are still very badly hurt. Live, Link. Live for Hyrule."

The young knight sat in shock. "I've got to see her," he mumbled.

"That is not wise," Impa replied. "You should not even try to walk right now. You no doubt have residuals from the potions we gave you to keep you under for the hours of surgery you underwent. If you move around too much, you may re-open your wounds."

"I have to see her… please…" Link whispered brokenly.

"Alright… but we will not tarry long." Impa sidled up to the bed and helped Link drape an arm around her. She passed a small cane into his free hand – kept in the room for when and if he did start to recover.

The pair made their way all the way out to the commons of the castle, lit by many torches. Link hobbled along in bandages and night-clothes with a light robe draped around him, escorted by Impa. Many people – the inhabitants of Castle Town as well as the Goron Chief Darunia and his son were gathered before a flower-draped altar. They stared at Link and whispered. Some were glad to see him alive. Others commented that the lad looked dead on his feet. Link heard them all, knowing that they didn't think he could.

The washed and beautifully dressed body of Queen Zelda lay upon the altar. She would have looked like she was merely sleeping if she was not so pale. Impa could feel Link shivering against her. He looked long and silent at her dead face which held a peace that belied the turmoil with which she'd lost her life.

A flash of memory came to Link of a lizalfos lying dead on the grass with an arrow in its scaly throat. Zelda was a fighter. She had not gone down easily. If only his sword had been swifter. Perhaps she wouldn't have gone down at all if only… if only…

Impa felt a sudden weight-shift as Link crumpled to the floor. The gathered mourners gasped. He'd completely passed out.

* * *

_That land lay at a convergence of intersecting points, inscribed by ens and naught… Blood…Young sprouts…Sky… _

_To trespass upon that land is strictly forbidden… _

Sad blue eyes looked at him from behind ancient, broken brickwork. Link braced himself upon the platform he'd found himself on, the Master Sword in his left hand. He hadn't touched that sacred blade since his other life, hadn't he? It was interesting that he had it now. The great hulk of a creature that stared at him with great curiosity was magnificent. It looked like an impossibly large statue of man with a bull's head, its stone horns broken. It had had patches of long, warm-looking hair upon various parts of its body.

The stone-warrior seemed to be pleading to Link with its eyes, for its face was a graven mask that would not move to allow speech. It seemed to be trying to warn him.

Link blinked awake to the sunlight streaming in through his window, lighting the Stone Mask in his collection with the warm color of morning. He turned his weary head to find Impa seated beside him, just as she was last night (or was it the night before? He could not tell how long he'd been out).

"How are you, Sleepyhead?" Impa asked with kind sadness lacing her voice.

"Impa…" Link whispered. "You know a lot of ancient legends… or you might at least know if the castle library might have a book on it… I heard a tall tale recently in my travels about a land of giants – a land of giants that have the power to bring back the dead."

"Link!" Impa exclaimed. "Absolutely not, Link."

Link shifted and hefted himself up painfully in bed. "So, you know of this legend."

"You encountered the Horned Tribe on your last outing, didn't you?" Impa said flatly. "All who practice shadow magic know of that story."

"So, it's really true, then?" Link asked excitedly.

"It is a legend. I never said it was true. It's just something the Sheikah know, as with most tales pertaining to shadow."

"If it is true…" Link was getting flushed now, "The horned-man I spoke to told me how to get to the land, except he said it couldn't be accessed anymore. If it's true, maybe… maybe this doesn't have to be the end for her… maybe I can bring Zelda back."

"Her spirit has flown, Link. Yours will, too, if you don't get your rest and let us take care of you." Impa reached over and rubbed his back soothingly. "I know…" she said, her voice cracking, "that you two were in love. And… she was always my little Zelda… like a daughter to me… but, Link, she can't be brought back. Not even the Great Fairies can do so."

Link looked at the gray-haired woman quizzically.

"We tried, Link," she said with a sorrowed half-smile.

Link winced.

"I know. A heavy cloud rests over every heart in the kingdom."

"Not that."

"Hmm?"

"I… have to go… I mean…um… go."

"Oh! Alright, that's a sign of some health coming back to you, I suppose… I'll fetch one of the manservants to help you."

* * *

Link had somehow convinced Impa to leave him be for sleep that night. He was staring to perk up and his ability to process meant that he'd likely need to use the chamber-pot in the middle of the night and didn't want anybody watching – at least that's what he'd told her. Zelda was slated to be buried in the morning, so he had to strike tonight if he wanted to make good on his plan.

He took all of the various potions he was taking for the healing of his injuries and mixed them together in a concoction that looked, smelled and tasted unholy. The young man downed it and when it failed to kill him, he found that it did make him stronger. He'd strapped on his usual clothing and boots as well as the extra-pocket-dimension pouch he kept key items in.

First, he used his powers of stealth – and the Stone Mask, which still apparently, despite years without use, had some of its magical properties to render one unnoticed – to sneak his way over to the Temple of Time. The Elder of the Horned Tribe had spoken of his fabled ancestor's use of a magical sword that "divided light from darkness and shadow from substance." Link, of course, did not have that ancient sword of light-seals, but the Master Sword just might do. It cleaved good from evil and light from dark as well as death from life.

Link was most pleased when the sword came out of its pedestal for him without putting him into a coma. He felt like he was reunited with an old friend. The once-Hero had a feeling that this was wrong – since he was not fighting Ganondorf (long-since executed via banishment to the Underworld by the Old Sages). Link assured himself that this was right because if he saved Zelda, he was saving Hyrule – just as things had always been. Even more than he needed her for the solace of his heart, Hyrule needed their wise queen. The scabbard appeared and he strapped the sacred sword to his back. He then made for the palace again to take his beloved from her altar.

Zelda's body had not seen much in the way of decay, for local priests had put spells of protection over her. Despite this, she was mildly stiff. Link looked ceiling-ward and hummed a song to himself as he rubbed her limbs vigorously, trying desperately not to think about what he was doing. He wrapped her in a cloak that bore the Sheikah "weeping eye" symbol and thought to how she, like her caretaker, Impa, had a bit of shadow in her, too, since she'd lived mysteriously in the other life that only he knew about.

The former Hero of Time got his mare, Epona, equipped and ready to run. He apologized to the animal about the extra weight of sacred flesh, but assured her that it would not be too much to bear. Off into the night he rode, toward the village he'd found in his last journey and toward the mountains beyond it.

* * *

_**The broken hero… the desperate fool… onward he goes… **_


	3. Of Beasts, Time and Mountains

**TO THE ANCIENT LAND**

**Chapter Three: Of Beasts, Time and Mountains **

The sunlight was stark in the lands beyond Hyrule's border. Morning brought Link to the Village of the Horned Men, or at least, to the place where he remembered it having been. Epona picked her hooves over empty ground around broken ruins, but the huts and houses that Link had seen before were gone. He called out, crying out for the Village Elder only to be answered by the indifferent wind. Perhaps the village had moved? Maybe he'd encountered a literal ghost-town? It would not be the first time for him, for Link had been to a place called Ikana and had fought the spirits of long-dead warriors some years ago. Maybe he just remembered the location wrongly. He was certain that this was the area where he had been sheltered and entertained.

Sighting the western mountains, Link spurred Epona toward them. The journey was long – through cliff-passes and a dark forest with falling leaves. The closer he got to his goal, the more he noticed an absence of Time. It wasn't just that the light did not fall when he thought it should be evening, it was something more. He could feel something off with an element he had a special connection to.

The grieving hero found an enormous and most unusual gate. He walked Epona through it, only to turn around. The remains of a bridge were broken at the gate and lay upon the land far below in a light-colored stone line up toward a great structure beyond what looked like fields and desert. Link shrugged his shoulders and walked Epona around the gate. He could feel the hairs on the back of his neck stand on end. By the descriptions he remembered the horned man giving, he had, indeed come upon the right place.

_A tower that the entities of shadow call home… a place of idols… round at the base with stone structures rising into the sky… a long bridge, suspended by magic… it is said to have been broken so that none may trespass upon the Forbidden Lands again… _

Link could feel great power here. As a Hylian, he had magic in the blood. His ears twitched as the wind up from the plain below ticked them. He felt drawn down. To his astonishment, a path seemed to appear out of nowhere along the side of the steep cliff. It zigzagged, but Epona could pick her way down it at a slow walk.

The sky was cloudy and the sun had failed to set. Link estimated that it must be around midnight, but night failed to show itself here. That was alright. He wouldn't have to face the light of the moon. The wind whipped and the trees shed a few leaves here and there. As he rode over the sands toward the enormous temple-structure, he saw doves landing and flittering off. Hawks screamed in the air above him. Link rode past strange moss-encrusted shrine-structures. He did not know what purpose they had once served, but he saw a black lizard with a silvery tail languidly crawling across the stone of one. Time seemed to move here in one way, but not in another – certainly not in the conventional sense. The Hero of Time felt that he was no hero here. Life lived outside of that element in this place.

Epona suddenly lurched. She whinnied madly and Link had to fight her out of her rear. The horse had almost spilled her burden. He barely managed to keep his fallen love in the saddle. The horse calmed. Over upon a rise, Link could have sworn he'd seen a black horse. It stamped a hoof and snorted. He patted Epona and coaxed her forward. The black horse began to run, letting its magnificent mane and tail flow. Inexplicably, it faded and vanished. Link was startled now, but continued on.

When he finally reached the tower, it was impressive. He looked up and up and could not tell where its apex separated from the sky. Not even the tallest towers of Hyrule Castle were so immense. Entire groves of trees grew upon layered levels. The young warrior led Epona up the steps inside. He looked around briefly and found a curious round pool. What looked to be stonework compartments held strange sculptures that seemed to glare at him menacingly. There were hills of dust at their feet and they looked as though they had been fragmented and mortared together again.

He cautiously took Zelda's corpse and laid it upon the altar at the front of the tower floor. He startled as strange beings of smoke began to crawl out of the cracks between the brickwork in the floor. Obeying his fighter's instincts, he brought out the Master Sword. He braced his knees, willed his magical energies into the blade and let out a fierce spin attack. The shadows dispelled, leaving him confused and wary. He stumbled as the floor shook in a mild earthquake and a voice echoed through the chamber.

It was a moan at first – and one that seemed to be made up of many voices. Link did not understand it. "Are you the entities of shadow that stand between death and life?" Link shouted into the stilled air.

The voice returned, struggling with some older version of Hylian than the language Link had grown up with. He could barely decipher it. "We are the Dormin," it said, masculine and feminine speech-styles mingling and both sounding as though they were spoken through water.

"I was warned not to come here," Link spoke. "But I had to." He looked up and around, trying to find the source of the echoing voices. He still had his sword out. "I am a knight of the kingdom of Hyrule. My queen has died. I…I need her… my kingdom needs her. I was told that you can perform resurrection when all other magic cannot. Please…"

"Thou art mortal and thou art a Hylian…" the Dormin answered. "Thou art of the ancient magic blood. The sword thou carries… it is not what we once knew…"

"I know!" Link answered. "It is not the sword that sealed you… but…"

"Thy sword is special and has great power. Only the power of gods can challenge gods. It shall suffice, if it is willing…"

"If it is willing?" Link questioned. "It's my sword… and I'm doing this for my kingdom. It has to work!"

"Impetuous. Reckless. Foolish," the voices assessed. "Dost thou know the price thou shall pay for the favor thou begs?"

Link sighed and sat down before the altar, resting the Master Sword upon his knees. "I know the story… at least as the elder who told it to me conveyed it. The 'Wanderer' did not know the price, but I do. If I take upon your task, I stand to lose myself… my life… maybe even my soul. If I must be reborn without my memories - that is nothing new to me, either – if what I've been told about myself by Hyrule's priests is true."

"Thou carries a strong sense of nobility. Thou art not an ordinary mortal. Know that to complete thy favor, thou must kill."

"I've killed before," Link said ruefully. He remembered all of the creatures he had slain to keep Hyrule safe as well as all of the blood he's shed to keep the hidden world of Termina from being destroyed. He'd been quite brutal in some cases, but those creatures were all evil beings, or at least mindless animals more or less influenced by evil energies, giving him no better choice. He never pretended that he did not know the smell of blood, however.

"To free my blood, thy murder must not be noble," the Dormin answered him. "Art thou prepared to give up thine innocence?"

Link stood. "I gave up my innocence the day I left my forest," he whispered.

"Thy sword is a sword of light," the Dormin intoned. "Follow the light. Complete the ritual and thy favor shall be done."

"Th-thank you," Link said, but the voice was gone.

He looked upon the pale face of Zelda on the altar. "I'm sorry," he said. He stepped up to her and grabbed her right hand – the one that had been marked by the Triforce of Wisdom – in both of his. He felt no resonance in his own fragment of Courage. In fact, he wondered if he would loose his piece of the Triforce, doing what he was setting out to do. The young man shivered at the coldness of his beloved's flesh.

"I'm afraid I can't let go," he said with a misty smile. "It's not just for me… Hyrule lost you far too soon. The kingdom will crumble and I cannot let that happen. Zel… if some essence of you is watching me now… and if we do not meet again… I am sorry for what I am about to become. I don't have a choice."

The young once-Hero of Time hopped upon his strong steed and held the Master Sword aloft. Sure enough, it shed a light for him to follow. Link still wondered if this was going to work, despite what the mysterious joined-voices had said to him. Magical swords usually were sealed to a specific purpose. If the Dormin was sealed with a specific enchanted weapon, it really should only be able to be unsealed with that same weapon – lost to history.

Perhaps the Master Sword really was that strong. Link had learned the legend behind it – after his own timeless journey. There was a book in the library of Hyrule Castle all about the legendary blade. The tale had it that it was created by a no-longer-existent patron-goddess of the Hylians, Hylia, who had worked under the auspices of the Golden Three. The sword was refined by three sacred flames the Three had left in the world, forged by the hand of an ancient hero. Some of the palace priests thought that Link might have been the reincarnation of that hero's spirit. Nothing was known for sure, especially since he'd left the Hero of Time honor in a separate reality. The Master Sword was mighty – Link knew that much, and it served to dispel shadows.

The light of his blade lead him to several rises and ridges. These he climbed easily via a combination of his own strength (he had always been good at climbing sturdy vines) and his hookshot, which he had brought with him.

Link investigated a hollow among cliffs and a strange mound of what appeared to be rubble and stone. As he stood far off, the pile of stone rubble began to move. He darted to the shadow of a cliff and watched as the hill rose, taking on the shape of something out of a dream.

It was enormous – a great armored stone man with a head resembling a bull's lumbered around. It held a giant club and shambled, looking here and there. Link was looking on in a stupor when a hoof came for him. The young man barely avoided being stomped into the earth. He whipped out his bow from his pouch and pumped a pair of arrows into its hairy leg, which looked like it had already been wounded. The giant moaned, but walked on. Birds followed the beast.

Link was no stranger to fighting enormous things, though he'd not encountered any living creature that was quite this big. The Colossus was bigger than Ganon had been in his demon-beast form in the other time. His arrows bounced off its skin. Swiftly, he scuttled up a hollow in one of the cliff-faces and found himself perched upon what appeared to be rain-worn ruins. The creature leaned and looked, unable to get to him. Its club thudded uselessly on the ground.

The Hylian felt like he was dreaming. Didn't he see this image in a fever-dream? Boldly, he drew out his hookshot and aimed toward it. He expected the hook just to bounce off like the arrows had, but he had to try. Link aimed for what looked to be soft flesh upon the creature, one of its hairy shoulders. The hook landed home, sending up a spurt of what looked like blood, save for its oily black color. The young warrior was sent hurtling toward his prey. He found purchase upon thick muscle and thick hair.

Link whipped around, grabbing thick bundles of fur madly. This was most unusual – he had fought giants in the past, but had come to them with sword in hand, fighting them at a distance or in hand-to-hand combat. In Hyrule, he'd fought dragons with bombs, arrows and a mighty hammer… He'd grabbed the nucleus out of a giant amoeba with the hook and chain… he'd felled an evil spirit that took upon the form of a disembodied torso and hands with tiny little arrows… Giant jungle warriors, mechanical bulls and nightmare fish in the other land - all of these were fought with variant means. Scrambling up the back of a stone Minotaur like a flea on a dog was quite novel.

He wondered if this is how Navi had felt when she nestled herself in his hair beneath his hat.

The glowing seal upon the Colossus' head caught his eye. This was the weak-point. Every monster had a weak-point. He wondered where his own weak-point might be… Bracing himself against the thrashing of the beast, Link brought the Master Sword up and then down.

He plunged and stabbed, graceless – without even the finesse of a butcher. Black oil spurted in high-pressure, like the blood of the earth. Regardless of the stains upon his tunic and the painful groaning of the creature, Link continued to stab and wedge, his thoughts upon Zelda.

The sword throbbed in his hand. A high-pitched sound echoed in his head, not in waves of air but in waves of spirit, if that were possible. Above the bull-moans of the dying Colossus, Link could have sworn that the Master Sword was screaming.

* * *

_**A gray journey across a gray land has begun… **_


	4. Master Sword

_**Note: **The list of Colossi-names was found on TV Tropes. I apologize for any possible inaccuracies._

**TO THE ANCIENT LAND**

**Chapter Four: Master Sword **

Link had been losing himself in this land. He'd been warned of a possible loss of memory by the Elder in the Village of Horned Men, but he did not think he was losing that. The warrior's mind felt intact, but he sensed that something else, something even more precious than memory was being taken from him by increment, with every enormous creature he'd returned to the earth.

He had known their names. Somehow, the knowledge of the victims' names had come to him. Link could not explain it. He did not have Navi or Tatl or any other fairy telling him about what he was fighting, nor did the voices of Dormin help him with identities. The voices echoed in his skull sometimes, but only when he was in peril and apparently taking too long to fell a beast to the entities' liking. A few vague tips as to the weaknesses of the Colossi were all he'd received.

Not knowing the source of the knowledge, he knew that he had faced Valus, Quadratus, Gaius and Phaerda and survived. His latest kill, Avion, had triggered within him questions without end. He leaned his aching back against the stone of one of the field-shrines. He looked up at a hawk on the wing.

He'd had occasional dreams about giant birds – ones that people rode. He could have dismissed this as the fancy of a vivid imagination, but it was something that stuck with him. It was like his childhood habit of looking for tiny people in the forest undergrowth instead of just fairies. It was like the nightmares he'd had for some years of watching himself – outside of his body – slain by Ganon. It was like the incessant wondering he had about the world of the time he'd left behind. Link had a creeping feeling that the Hyrule he'd saved would not remain in peace forever.

It was, indeed, a terrible thing to have enough strangeness in the mind but enough of a normal function to know that something is "wrong" with you. Link had once thought his problems to be clear-cut: As soon as he'd received a fairy, he'd become a true Kokiri and would live in the forest forever or until the time came for the children of the forest to fade back into it. He'd have a sacred companion and would probably finally learn how to blend into the mist like everyone else did and would stop frightening the forest animals with what his best friend, Saria, used to call his "strong presence." When he'd been gifted with Navi, instead of simplifying, his life became infinitely more complicated.

Link knew that he was not a normal person by any stretch of the imagination. He knew that he was a little bit crazy. Perhaps that is what it took to play the Hero's role. The unusual nature of his mind had come into the fore of his thoughts as he rode a giant bird over an ancient lake. He'd never done this type of thing before, yet he had. Of course he'd fought giant monsters in his own land before, but somehow, he remembered what it had felt like – specifically – to ride a large bird. He'd never mounted such a steed – at least outside of his dreams and in the life that he knew. He also had the thought of Avion that it was "not just a riding-bird," but, "laid beak to tail and wing-tip to wing-tip, as large as an entire city, suspended in the sky." He felt as if, at one time, he had lived in just such a city, even though he could not recall such a place outside of hazy dreams as he took afternoon naps on the soft grass of the fields of Hyrule.

Where had such thoughts come from? They baffled him.

The young man had busied himself whittling arrow-shafts. He did not have an unlimited supply of arrows and had to make some quick ones to see him through future fights. He'd heard once somewhere that there was a spell one could learn or buy that could alleviate the problem of running out of arrows, but Link did not have that spell. He had a small protection ability, a limited shield… and he could generate fire from his internal body heat out around him on a limited-level. His weapons, however, had to be cared for to stay in good condition and the ones that required ammunition could only be used if he found or made such ammunition. There were no weapons or hunting-supply shops here. If there ever had been, their owners and keepers had died out long ago. There were many trees in this land, plenty of sharp rocks and even some simple metal ores and sands Link found he could melt down with his Din's Fire to make arrowheads… Birds were not in short supply here – not all of them were giant or statuesque - and they left their spent feathers upon the ground.

The fruit of the trees was filling and sweet, and the branches provided wood to whittle to his needs. Link was glad that he had the forethought to bring a small knife with him. Crafting ammunition was not work for a sword. He picked up and repaired any spent arrows he could, treating them as special treasures. He found them obnoxious to make from scratch. He needed them, too. The beings he slew in this land fell only to his sword, but well-placed arrows did a fair bit of damage. They also got the creatures' attention. Link found that he had to use strategy to lure any given Colossus into a favorable position. Hitting the first one with his hookshot had been sheer luck.

The second had only gone down with arrows to its feet and Link had just climbed the beast. The third looked like it had enough soft areas to try the hookshot – but even with the long chain, the tip could not reach past the giant's knees – or where "knees" should have been. Link had felt like a bug with a toothpick going after that one. He'd also felt dishonorable. Gaius had come to him as a knight seeking sword-to-sword combat. From Link's perspective, the great knight's sword was as big as a bridge, meaning that he had to do things dirty. Link had learned with Iron Knuckles and similar enemies that sometimes going in from behind and other "cheap" tactics were the only ways to survive fights.

Phaedra – Link had hated that battle. Tricking it into hunkering down so he could climb its tail and mount it was one thing – that had been a relatively simple matter. What he'd despised about the fight was the fact that the creature had taken on a shape resembling something he'd loved. Link adored horses. He had many memories of days spent at LonLon Ranch learning about them under Malon. His dear mare, Epona, had taken him through many dangers. The bizarre screaming of the Colossus had not helped him to do what he had to do.

Avion- the phoenix, had to be lured with arrows. Link had used the hookshot to stay upon its flailing wings at certain points during the fight. Most of his time was spent running down its tail as though it were a highway. The stone bird had been especially difficult to fell because his sword seemed to have taken on a mind of its own.

Link had noticed awkward things with the Master Sword when he was fighting the second Colossus. He'd aim it for a good solid stab to one of the huge bull's seals only to have the blade glance off hair and hide as if it had been moved by an un-felt wind. The warrior had managed to force it to work for him, but after that, it had been growing increasingly heavy.

The problem was at a point where Link could barely unsheathe the sword and its tip dragged in the dirt whenever he carried it. The young man wondered if this had anything to do with the mysterious shadow-threads that painfully pierced his heart whenever he'd defeated a giant. It probably had more to do with his actions in general. He knew that he was losing something essential to him every time he broke a seal and watched the oil erupt and spray out of something it had given life to.

As Link sat, he drew his sword to polish the blade. His hand shook as he struggled to free it from the scabbard. He laid the impossibly weighty slat of metal across his knees. It grew light once he'd stopped gripping the hilt tightly. Link experimentally tightened and loosened his grip, feeling the sword's peculiar weight-shift. He sighed.

The Master Sword was a sword of Heroes. It was his sword. It was also – according to all he had learned about it and felt from it – a sword that desired justice. It was a magical sword, one that could not be touched by evil persons and one that could only be wielded by Hyrule's true Hero.

The Master Sword was supposed to have a special connection to the Hero's spirit, and, indeed, Link had felt this. However, this was not the first time the sacred blade had treated him cruelly. The first time he'd tried to use it, he'd been put into a coma for seven years. There was a rumor that the sword would become heavy for any Chosen Hero who had lost his or her way – that a Hero who'd become unworthy of the title and position would lose their ability to wield the Master Sword.

"Have I become unworthy?" he asked the sword, not expecting an answer.

"_Mattas…" _

Link's eyes widened and his ears perked. He thought he saw an image flickering in the blade, an image most strange. He stared and he could have sworn he saw a face staring back at him. The sword was giving him a vision of a blue woman with vacant eyes. The sword's edges glowed. Link heard music echo in his head and felt himself drawn into a dream-world. He felt his body fall away from him, succumbing to sleep. The young swordsman found himself standing upon a plain dampened with very shallow water.

The sky was filled with clouds, but much bluer than the sky over the Forbidden Lands. The ground reflected it perfectly. Link wondered, for a moment, if he had been taken to a particular room of the Water Temple back in Hyrule. He'd had an important battle with himself there. Instead of seeing his dark side manifest, he saw a floating blue woman with a blue and purple cape.

"Do not be alarmed, Master," she said, "We are within a non-physical plane, a 'room' within your mind. I am only capable of speaking with you here, as I am incapable of taking a physical form in this age."

"Master?" Link asked. "Who are you?"

"My original designation," she answered, "was 'Fi.' It serves as my name. I was given it in another life. In this life, you only have known me as the Master Sword."

Link gasped in awe. "You are the spirit of the Master Sword? I had no idea there as an actual form… or that I've been wielding a girl."

Fi continued to float and stare at him with her alien, pupil-less eyes. "I have no technical gender, Master Link. I once had the form that you see for ease of communication before I completed my original mission."

Link rubbed his head. "Original mission?" he muttered.

"I was created by the Goddess Hylia to aid the first among her champions. My Skychild-Master tempered me in the sacred flames of Farore, Nayru and Din to enable me to repel Evil."

"You put me to sleep for seven years… in the other time."

"You were not ready for heavy battle, Timewalker-Master. You would have died."

Link walked along the mirrored land, gathering his thoughts. The sword-spirit floated easily beside him. Link was reminded of Navi, but shook the thought from his head. Navi was too small and brightly-lit for him to tell if she'd worn fishnet stockings.

"So, you protected me then," the Hylian said, "and you saw me through my battles."

"You are my Master, Link."

"If so," Link demanded, "why have you abandoned me now? I can barely lift the sword anymore! If it stays like this, I will die!"

"My analysis indicates that if you continue upon the path that you have chosen - that you will die."

"I have done wrong, haven't I?"

"Master, my designation is to repel evil. You have been using me to slay neutral and innocent beings."

Link hung his head and sighed deeply. "I guessed as much that you were lost to me when I began this quest… with the first taste of black blood. Have I been corrupting you?"

"I am incorruptible," Fi answered blandly. "Life and death lay within the hand of the wielder."

Link gave Fi a pleading look. By her mannerisms, he guessed that she could not read emotions, or that she could possibly read them in an analytic way, but could not understand them. His eyes pleaded with her, anyway.

"I have to save Zelda," he said. "She is the key to Hyrule's stability. Isn't that what you were created for? To aid Hyrule in time of need?"

"Hylia, Her Grace, created me to balance out and destroy evil," the weapon-spirit answered.

"Hylia is an extinct goddess," Link countered, "at least according to legend. All you have now is me as your master."

"That information is incorrect, Master Link," Fi answered. "Hylia's spirit still exists. Her Grace took the form of a mortal to save the world and has become a mortal's spirit."

"I do not understand."

"Her Grace's designation downgraded from Hylia to the Royal Family line in order to be Hyrule's rightful ruler whenever the people most needed her."

Link's jaw hung.

"Hylia's spirit is Zelda's," Fi concluded.

"Then you must help me!" Link cried.

"Her Grace's spirit has completed this lifetime."

"I'm trying to bring her back! Hyrule still needs her! I need her!"

Fi continued to stare blankly at him. "It is not my directive to kill innocent entities."

Link wrung his hands in exasperation and paced in the inch-deep water. "I know that!" he yelped, "But… they aren't people! I'm not even sure they can think! The people of Hyrule slaughter livestock to feed themselves and keep themselves alive – how is this different? I know it's different but… Master Sword, your queen and your goddess has fallen. We have a chance to raise her up again. Please help me… help me save Hylia."

Fi nodded gently. "I shall obey your directives, Master Link. Your motives are pure while your actions are not. Know that I cannot save you from what you are becoming, nonetheless, I will help you save Her Grace."

"Thank you…" Link said with exhausted gratitude.

"My analysis indicates that your current path is unwise."

* * *

Link blinked awake. The sword across his knees reflected only sunlight. He turned to see a horse's snout beside him, snuffling the grass by his feet. The horse was not Epona, but the mysterious black animal he saw from time to time. Link reached out to touch the beast, but it vanished as it had every other time he got near to it. Epona was grazing in the distance. Link put the Master Sword back in its scabbard and found that it was as light in his hand as it had been before he'd entered the cursed country.

He felt a little twinge of pride. He'd argued his sword into submission.

The song he'd heard in his dream would not leave his mind alone. He brought out his ocarina from his pouch and tried to reproduce the notes. Link knew that the Ocarina of Time had different properties in different lands. He did not know if the substance it was made from was a factor, but it had differing effects when he'd used it in Termina versus his use of it in Hyrule. He'd originally held onto it at Zelda's request until it sort-of became his because he knew how to use it best.

Here, in the Forbidden Land, there seemed to be to be no magical effects at all. The Ocarina of Time merely played music. The only magic it retained was the effect of Epona's call-song. Link could not warp himself anywhere or manipulate Time. Aside from his horse, he was alone here. He played the song until he matched it perfectly with one in his memory. Although the spirit of the sword had struck him as a character lacking in emotion, the song that had played in the background of the vision struck Link as mysterious and sad. It was a "lament" he decided. It had a quality to it that was not quite the same as a funeral-dirge, but carried a sense of regret.

Upon mastering this new song, Link rode to all of the places where he'd met Colossi and had returned them to rubble. He created a new ritual. Link struck the Master Sword into the nearest available earth or gapped brickwork before each fallen foe. He'd perch upon the remains and bring out his ocarina to play _Fi's Lament_. He decided that he would do this as soon as possible for each Colossus he felled.

He may have convinced the Master Sword to work with him again, but it did not mean that she did not deserve to mourn.

* * *

_**Take sword in hand and find me… **_


	5. Black Blood and Bitter Poison

**TO THE ANCIENT LAND**

**Chapter Five: Black Blood and Bitter Poison**

Some of the battles he'd survived reminded the young warrior of home. Running through the "maze with the Minotaur" and felling the beast that had come to Link's mind as "Barba" was not unlike fighting corrupted creatures deep in the dungeons and temples of Hyrule. Being in the confines of an ancient temple rather than out in the open almost comforted the once-Hero of Time in a very peculiar way.

Hydrus, the leviathan, wasn't at all like the corrupted amoeba, Morpha, and wasn't quite like Gyorg, the great killer fish of Termina, but something about fighting it had felt familiar. Link wondered how he got out of that one without being fried or drowned. He hadn't even lost his hat. Fighting it made him miss the time when he'd partnered with the soul-remains of a Zora and could generate electricity from his sleek, fish-like body. This time, however, he had not done something as honorable as assisting the soul of young Zora musician murdered in his prime. In fact, Link wondered if Mikau, Darmani and the poor young Deku whose lives he'd finished for them were looking upon him from the Land of the Dead in shame. He wasn't bringing them back. He was going through this gauntlet for only one soul.

There were many ways in which Link found to heal himself in this mysterious land. He was surprised when a little rest, including a good, long sleep at one of the shrines, had cured his lungs of feeling like they were filled with acid after his encounter with the "dodongo" – the enormous lizard, Kuromuri in the ancient coliseum. The creature had spit clouds of poisonous gas that depleted his strength swiftly. His head was spinning the entire time he'd fought it.

He'd tried fighting it the way he'd fought the giant lizard he'd known: bombs. He'd hurled a bomb at it from one of the windows of the great stone "pail" he'd found himself in. It landed home on the creature's head. The resulting explosion got its attention, but that was about it. Link's most powerful weapon for the breaking of stone had failed utterly to even dint that living statue. All it had done was to anger the beast and earn Link an aching chest, coughing fits and an almost-death.

He could still smell the sulfur.

He'd fought Basaran and Dirge after that and was convinced that the sacrificial mountains were becoming increasingly aggressive. Link wondered if they somehow knew what had happened to their kin and were merely stepping up the fight for survival. Epona had preformed beautifully for him, luring the creatures to advantageous positions and keeping him safe. Link had never battled any beast quite like Basaran, though it reminded him of a tortoise. Dirge had reminded him of Twinmold in Termina, but there was only one of him. There were also wild Moldorms in some of the sandier parts of the desert where the Gerudo lived back in Hyrule. Dirge was much fiercer than any of them. That fight had disturbed Link greatly, for the beast had eyes that seemed to stare into his soul.

Looking into its face was worse than looking at a Sheikah-mark stone. Those things could be quite silly, with their random gossip about passers-by that someone with a special mask could listen to and how they'd launch themselves into the sky when given a bomb. In contrast, Link thought that "Dirge" was the most appropriate name for the beast that had pursued him in the sandy lair. It seemed to know that its own "funeral" had arrived, even as it had tried to make the encounter Link's. The eyes were unnerving, but also sad – especially since he knew he had to shoot arrows right into them if he wanted to leave the lair alive. Epona, for her part, clearly did not want to be eaten, so he had to fire off some arrows for her, at least.

Link wondered how much more aggressive the Colossi would get. He was more than halfway done. The land was truly beginning to feel cursed to him. Although he could heal through rest and did not have to rely upon potions from makers that were not there and ingredients that did not grow here, he did not feel as healthy as he did when he'd entered the country.

He'd caught a glimpse of his reflection in the Master Sword sometime after fighting Kuromuri. The sword was obeying him now, but the image of his own face that he saw in it prompted him to find the nearest pool of still water to the shrine he had napped at to make sure "Fi" wasn't playing some kind of trick on him to try to dissuade him from his task. He looked quite ragged. Even his eyes looked like they were going from blue to red – the irises ringed crimson. His skin was as pale as that of a corpse and was darkening in places that resembled veins and fissures. Link wondered, with great discomfort, if he was becoming like that mirror-apparition he'd faced in the Water Temple in the time-outside-of-time.

Was he becoming everything he was supposed to "conquer" as a Hero, now?

On top of that, he was desperately hungry. The young Hylian found precious little to eat in the empty country. There were trees here and there that bore fruit – some of it sweet, some of it bland. It had been filling at first, but now it was lacking. It kept him going and made him feel stronger, but it didn't do much for him in the way of protein. Link had been able to fuel his growing muscles without eating animal-flesh when he was a child because the Kokiri Forest provided everything the Kokiri children (and he) needed. The Kokiri did not eat meat – not so much because they were "pure innocent spirits of the forest who refused to kill" so much as they were small, easily distracted and could not effectively hunt. A few would grow little gardens, but they didn't raise livestock of any kind. Back in those days, meat just wasn't practical.

When Link had left the forest, however, he'd discovered quite a carnivore-tendency in himself. When he was first served meat by kindhearted Hylian adults out in the "wide world," he had not known where it had come from and was horrified when he'd first found out. After that, he decided that he liked it and that he needed it to maintain fighting-strength. Most meals eaten in Hyrule were not as nutritionally-balanced using only plant-matter as what the Great Deku Tree could provide for the Kokiri. Link had learned the art of fishing particularly quickly – for he found fish very much to his liking.

Link had found some fish to catch here, though he had to learn to do it by hand since he'd not brought any fishing-gear. The local salmon species tasted nice seared over an open campfire, but he did not catch them often enough to sate the more or less constant hunger he'd developed. He was hopeless to shoot any of the swift-flittering doves. There were turtles about, but he did not have the cook-pot or the desire to try turtle soup for the first time, especially after dealing with Basaran. With their tough shells and hard heads, Link was certain there wasn't enough meat on them to be worth the trouble. He'd taken to shooting the ubiquitous black lizards out of desperation. The first time he'd retrieved a silver tail from a gecko that escaped into the sand, he worried that he'd get sick. It was not customary in Hyrule for people to eat reptiles. He'd cooked it and eaten it and found that he'd felt stronger afterward. Also, it had tasted like cucoo.

The Hylian warrior had been quite hungry the day he'd decided to try to climb Dormin's Tower, itself. He'd seen a lot of places covered with brickwork that was cracked and looked like it had some finger and toe-holds in it, as well as a thick carpeting of moss and vegetation where water dripped down from somewhere. Link's motivation was in part, sheer curiosity and in part, hope that there were some food-bearing trees or some small, dumb, edible animal somewhere among the broken stone and greenery. Of course, Link brought out his hookshot.

The young man in green blended into the vegetation and swung like a monkey, alternating taking a firm hold and launching his wonderful chained-gadget into any reasonably soft patch of moss and gaps in the architecture he could find. Something in the very back of his mind told him that he was a "cheater" for using that tool, though he had no idea what "game" it was he was cheating at.

He found, to his surprise, stairs leading up to some secret-looking place. Link wandered straight into what looked like a miniature paradise. There was grass growing upon thin soil atop stone as well as trees. Sunlight filtered down through spires he yet could not reach. There were waterfalls, presumably created from gathered rainwater in places above. Perhaps they were just magical. The cascades looked like they were drawn from some neverending source and they spilled into deep channels in the floor. Leaves fluttered down from the trees and Link saw that there were fruits upon them. Famished, he brought out his bow and knocked a few fruit-clusters down.

Link retrieved his arrows and yanked a ripe-looking fruit off of one of the clusters. He bit into it with great greed. It tasted strange – a bit like the bland fruits he'd found out in the fields but with a bitter aftertaste. It was not a savory fruit, or even tart – it had something of a bile-flavor to it. He choked down the mouthful he had bitten and spit out the juice.

The young Hylian began to feel light-headed. He was keenly aware of the heartbeat in his chest and the sound of his pulse in his ears. He shook his head and walked around the ancient garden. He bypassed the rest of the fruit he'd felled. Something was off with it. Maybe it just wasn't as ripe as it looked. He'd find better fruit from one of the groves he knew about down below.

The sound of laughter caught his attention. It wasn't the voices of Dormin – it was too distinctly human. Link turned and saw a young woman with dark hair standing in a sunbeam. She appeared translucent. The waterfall and stonework behind her were as shadows through her form. She knelt and caught a small child that ran into her arms. The child was wearing a makeshift-looking diaper that appeared to have been woven from leaf-fibers or some such thing. That was not his strangest feature. Aside from being as translucent as the woman, the little boy had a pair of small, but prominent horns.

"You and I," the woman said, speaking to the child, "When you get big enough to make a big-boy journey… we're going to go to a place outside of this land where people are good. We'll find a world where there are no sacrifices…"

The woman stood up and the little boy hugged her legs. They both stared straight at Link – as though they could see them. The child hugged the woman's shins more tightly and looked quite fearful. In an instant, a shaft of light from a parting cloud above caught them, joining their larger sunbeam. They both vanished into motes of golden light.

"Strange," Link said to himself, feeling even lighter-headed. He was noticing a notable weakness in his joints now and tiredness. Waves of pain began pulsing through his stomach. He lurched and expelled the meager contents thereof upon the ground. He went to his knees on the cool grass.

"St-stupid…fr-fruit…" he said to himself as he clenched his teeth and shivered.

Before he knew it, he saw a hand thrust below his chin, offering itself for him to take it. "Need help?"

Link looked up and fell down on his rear end in a startle. A semi-transparent figure stood before him dressed much like him. There was some color to this apparition, - green for the clothing, leather-brown for his gear, blue for his eyes and sandy-blond for his hair.

"Who are you?" Link asked.

"I am the Skychild-Hero," the young man answered. "I am one of those who have carried the Spirit of the Hero – your spirit."

"Huh, what?"

"Stand up, Timewalker. You did not think you were the first, did you?"

"Well… I know a bit about the legend of how the Master Sword was forged…"

"That was me," replied the not-really-a-child Skychild. "My title comes from the fact that I lived in a country that is forgotten to our people now, a city in the clouds."

Link scratched his head. He saw other spirits that looked vaguely like himself around the garden. Four children argued and played a game of tag in a sunbeam, grabbing each other's hats. A man who looked a little older than he was and who was wearing a tattered cape glared at him from behind a pillar and disappeared into a shadow.

"What am I seeing?" Link asked the ghost of the Hero that had bothered to talk to him.

The Skychild smiled. "Others who have carried the Hero's Essence. Those four over there are actually one person – the Divided-Heart. The one-who-became-four came after my time. The angry fellow came before me – he is Hylia's Chosen. His story did not end well, I'm afraid. He had a rough life in general, but our spirit was forged through him. He made us strong.

Link heard a squeaking sound and looked down at his boots, certain he'd felt something jumping up and down on his foot. Puzzled, he bent down to pick up a tiny person. He held this little boy up to his face in the palm of his hand. "And who might you be?" he asked with a grin.

"Some call me the Little Hero," the mouse-sized boy answered, "but my Minish friends call me what I prefer: The Colossus-Slayer."

Link felt himself freeze.

"Yeah," the Little Hero said. "It's kind of ironic, isn't it? I felled monsters many times my size when I was in this form."

The tiny ghost did a backflip off Link's hand and grew into the size of a child around the age of nine or ten years when he hit the ground.

"So, why are all of you here, in this garden? If you're all long-dead, haven't you moved on? If you are all reflections of me aren't you… you know… me now?"

"You do know that you're dreaming, right?" the Skychild answered.

"I suppose so…My stomach still hurts."

The Little Hero tugged on the bottom of Link's tunic and looked at him very seriously. "What you are doing in this land is putting us all in peril."

"How can it, if you all came before me?"

"Over there," the Little Hero said, pointing.

Link saw a sleek, ghostly wolf gracefully run in between the pillars and trees of the garden. A flurry of something that looked like shattered shadow spun around the animal and it shifted into the form of a young man who looked very much like the Skychild.

"Who is he?" Link asked.

"The Twilightwalker," the Skychild answered. "He is a Hero of dualities, perhaps a bit like you have become in this land. He walks both shadow and light and is both a man and a beast."

"He came before me?"

"No," the Skychild answered. "He is to come after us, after you – but your actions in this land have put his existence at jeopardy."

The Twilightwalker looked directly at Link and reached out to him. He vanished instantly into motes of light. Link reached out for him and grabbed the air where his hand used to be. The Skychild clapped him on the back and the Little Hero hugged his leg.

"Why?" Link asked desperately.

"The spirit of the Hero contains a certain measure of ethical purity," the Skychild answered.

"We aren't perfect!" chimed the Little-one.

"He is right," the Skychild continued, "We aren't perfect, but, much like the Master Sword – or even the Four Sword that my small Colossus-Slayer friend and the Divided-Heart are familiar with – we have a certain quality to us. It is a quality of courage, of course, but also of sound judgment and of hope for those around us."

"I asked the Master Sword if I was corrupting it," Link sighed. "She told me she was incorruptible, but worried about me."

"Exactly," the Skychild said. "We are worried about you and, by extension - we are worried about the essential Hero's Spirit."

Link looked down, then to the children arguing in the sunlight and to the stern eyes of the man in the shadows. "If I become too corrupted, future Heroes for Hyrule cannot be…" he whispered.

"Now he gets it," the Little Hero said. "Think about it, Timewalker. How much of the black blood has already coated your hands and pierced your heart?"

"How much of the black blood already runs through your veins?" the Skychild added.

"You may gain enough that even someone meant to walk both the light and the shadow cannot be," a new voice sounded beside him. Link turned and saw that the ghostly wolf that represented the Twilightwalker was beside him.

Link looked at each of the other Heroes and furrowed his brow in frustration. He gesticulated with his hands. "I can't turn back now!" he yelped. "I am trying to save Zelda! And by extension, our kingdom! I have to see this through… I have to see her warm and alive again."

"Be careful that you do not become a beast," the wolf cautioned, "or at least not the kind of beast you do not want to become."

With that, the spectral animal ran off and vanished. The other Heroes turned and walked way, vanishing into the sunlight that cascaded down from the gaps in the top of the tower.

"Perhaps you will listen to me." - A feminine voice, and a specific one, the one that Link most missed. He turned around.

"Zelda."

Lady Zelda was merely a specter, just like the various Heroes. Nonetheless, Link reached out to hold her and found himself grasping vapor. She stepped apart from him and regarded him with a sad expression.

"Link… you don't have to bring me back," she said. "Not like this, my Hero, not like this."

"Zelda you're… I want to hold you again. I wanted to spend my life with you… even if it was only serving you as your knight… I…"

"Link, darling…" Zelda touched his face and his ears with cold air where her warm fingers would have been had she been in her body. "What are you doing to yourself? I did not want to die, but I don't want you to… not like this… not like this. What you're doing is so unwise, Link."

"Unwise…" the young man answered. "You would know, right?"

"I lived my life. You need to learn to let go – for your sake. You're just destroying yourself slowly. Hyrule will endure. Trust me."

"Maybe… maybe it would be best to turn back."

Zelda vanished and Link closed his eyes. He found himself curled up on the grass, shivering and with stabbing pains in his middle. He clutched his abdomen and sat up wearily. He shook his head and smelled vomit on the grass. The Hylian blinked and looked around. The garden was still save for the leaves falling gently from the trees and the rushing waterfalls.

He drew his aching body up and the pain in his middle subsided. He looked down at a fallen cluster of fruit. He kicked it. "Poison," he muttered. "I wonder what would make the trees up here grow poison fruit? They look the same as the trees down below…"

He made his way down the staircase leading from the secret garden and tried to decide upon a hookshot-and-climbing strategy to get himself safely down. He knew that Epona would be waiting for him. Maybe he could find something safe to eat and some pure water to drink to flush his system.

He had more sword-light to follow. He was not finished with his quest. Dreams were dreams and poison-borne hallucinations were unreliable guides to living. His subconscious was being a pest. All the same, a cold breeze from one of the shadowed places of the garden lifted his hat and hit the back of his neck. Link shuddered.

* * *

_**Out and down the adventurer goes, warnings un-heeded and lessons un-learned, to the fiercest of battles that await him… **_


	6. Fierce and Reluctant Dragons

_**Note:** There is a reference in here to events in the Ocarina of Time manga – but not in the game. If you've not read the manga or seen bits of it online, one of the bosses is given an expanded, tragic backstory. I decided to use it. _

**TO THE ANCIENT LAND**

**Chapter Six: Fierce and Reluctant Dragons**

Audacity. Hubris.

These had belonged to Link and they'd been knocked right out of him when a stone claw raked across his chest, hitting him with a force that was the rough equivalent of him falling from one of Hyrule Castle's towers. He staggered amid spats of his own blood upon the stone floor and just barely made it into a crack too small for the Colossal-lion to reach into.

He had followed the sword-light down the zigzag trail, into the ravine and up into the remains of a small temple. Upon arriving at this place, Link had felt quite confident and at ease. This was an indoor temple again – or at least the space was mostly indoors. It made him feel at home. He could see that there was not much space to work with, relatively, but he was also expecting the Colossus here to be lumbering, as most of them had been. Those that had used the air or the sand as mediums for movement had been quite quick, but all of the land-based statues had been easy to outpace and to generally work around. The sacrifices had been growing more difficult and aggressive, Link had reminded himself, but he thought he could handle another dungeon-challenge.

Now he was panting and bleeding to death. His ribs, miraculously, felt intact, but he'd been deeply wounded. He'd barely had time to register the name that had come as a spirit-whisper in his ear: "Celosia," before he was trying to dodge something as speedy and nimble as a cat, dressed in concrete and iron armor. The beast was about the size Ganon had been in full-beast form, but was several times as fast. It really should not have been possible, Link thought.

Dormin was no help. A message came in the voices, something about the Colossus "fearing the flames" that Link could barely register. He was surprised that he was still conscious. Panting against the warm stone of the altar he was pressed up to was making him feel slightly better. He turned and reached up to try to climb the thing to reach the burning censer at its top. Blood ran down his arm from where he'd been clutching his chest. A droplet of it quivered on his skin where the fabric on his shirt had been torn. It hung, suspended, below his wrist, halfway to his elbow. There, it caught the firelight in such a way that Link could see through it. Among the deep red swirled a black shadow. It was like looking at a pane of stained glass marred by smoke. It dripped and fell to the stone as he hauled himself up.

Link regretted that the Stone Mask did not work on these beasts. He'd tried it once. He forgot which of them he'd tried it on, but, apparently, it did not make him as unnoticeable to Colossi as it had to people. Maybe it was because the mask was born of stone, like they were. People may not notice a dull gray rock, but living mountains could, perhaps, recognize one of "their own." It certainly had not given him friendly terms with their kind. The rest of his mask collection had been left at home, the Stone Mask only brought as an afterthought, since he'd used it to retrieve the Master Sword and Zelda's body. He'd stashed it when he no longer needed it. Its powers would have been useful in this land if they'd worked. He truly wanted to use some sort of an invisibility cloak on this one.

Maybe it was his lightheadedness from taking what had very nearly been a one-hit kill, but Link wondered just what would happen if he could get a bunch of Colossi marching in a row as he played his ocarina while wearing the Bremen Mask – his animal-charming device. He shook the thought from his mind. Not only would it be unlikely to work, but he wouldn't survive the earthquakes, alone. The land would be pounded into dust and all the land's mountains rendered into valleys.

Celosia slammed its great head into the altar Link was standing upon. The Hylian struggled to keep his balance. One of the ever-burning sticks in the censer (how was that even possible they were not consumed to ash long ago with no one tending the fire?) was knocked loose and to the floor. The Colossus recoiled from it briefly and then resumed growling, pawing and pacing.

Link jumped down and ran to grab it. He snatched it up just before Celosia reached him. Waving the flaming torch in the air seemed to terrify the creature. Something about its pathetic whimpering tugged at his heart before the pain of a tugged muscle in his chest reminded him of his should-have-been-fatal wounds. The living-statue crept back, back, and then back some more, making its stone-slow way toward the edge where the temple floor dropped off into the canyon. Clearly, driving it down there was a key to defeating it – somehow.

The fire on the torch burnt out. Link dropped the spent stick and hauled tail. He closed his eyes and mustered up something inside him – a silent prayer to the Goddess Din – as if his goddesses could be heard in this accursed place. He brought up that which he had been using to build his cooking-fires and to warm him and light his way when even the eternal daylight felt too cold to him.

The spell of Din's Fire exploded all around him. The Colossus took notice. It backed away from the circle of flames surrounding the young warrior quickly. It had hauled its massive body along so quickly that Link did not even see its retreat. With closed eyes, finishing the spell, he heard the sound of something heavy falling upon rock and dirt and an astounding cracking sound.

The once-Hero's boldness returned to him. He had a valuable weapon against this beast that he could generate from his own body. Previously a mouse, he was now a dragon. He wandered to the edge, made haste down the edges of earth and found where his prey had fallen. Celosia appeared to be alive, but stunned. The fall had cracked the armor on its back like a cooked crab cracked from its shell. There was the soft seal, shining, beckoning to Link. He jumped off the cliff's edge, straight for the exposed, furry spine.

And promptly missed.

Link hauled himself just as a claw swiped for him. He gritted his teeth and called up his firepower again. He knew that there was a limit on how many times he could use Din's Fire – or any spell – before replenishing his energies. It worked, causing the creature to back up in fear like it had before. The young man thought quickly and brought out his hookshot before the wall of flame fully dissipated. His aim was true and, in an instant, he was riding Celosia like some men in Hyrule's countryside rode bulls to prove their toughness.

A few stabs and it was down. Link didn't even try to run from the black threads this time. He was so exhausted he was sure he'd passed out before they'd even reached him.

The twelfth Colossus was so strange that Link was not sure, after he'd bested it, if what he'd experienced had been a dream.

He'd allowed himself to heal after the last encounter, but not completely. He'd had the forethought to bring some bandages with him and he used them to cover the raw cuts. They'd shallowed considerably after he'd awakened before Zelda's altar in Dormin's Tower. All he knew was that their partial-healing had been unnatural. He'd been healed just enough to carry on.

* * *

Finding the twelfth sacrifice had been most of the trouble. The light of the Dormin reflected off the Master Sword had led him into a shady forest. Epona kept getting confused and would turn him around, taking him back the way they'd come in. This happened several times. Link wondered if he'd hit a patch of ground that was like the Lost Woods he knew, but with no music played by forest creatures to guide him.

He'd eventually found a lake that was dotted with strange shrines. It would have made the Zora people back home proud. The mountain he slew in that place had a flat back, like some sort of huge flatworm covered in thick moss and grass. It had a great iron eyeless mask with horns that shot magical lightning. It had to be magical; for it was softened by water in the way electricity generated by other means was not. The weirdest feature of the being was its teeth. Link climbed the Colossus and found stone teeth – very much like human teeth – sprouting from the very top of its head.

Figuring out how to reach its tender heart-seal was no easy matter, but Link found steering it like it was his own personal steed was rather… fun. He questioned the ethics of it – it being an essentially neutral creature that he had to torture the teeth of. His own jaw ached as he set his sword to the stone protrusions that guided the beast toward the shrine-tops he sought vantage on.

If he ever got to describe his adventure to anyone in Hyrule when it was over, he decided he might just gloss over this battle as "too weird for words."

* * *

The thirteenth sacrifice was the most difficult. It was more difficult than all of the black blood offerings that had come before and it was harder on Link than any that would come after. The actual fighting of the Colossus was a simple matter – a battle of a few stages, but not too trying to figure out. The creature, itself, was not a fierce one that fought for its life as hard as any of the others. This was one of the reasons why it was the hardest to kill.

It was a battle without honor that broke the Hylian's heart.

He arrived to the Blasted Lands upon Epona and investigated an old shrine. He was most curious about the strange circular gates that lay broken in the desert. Epona startled and whinnied when something erupted from the sands. Twisting and turning itself into the sky was a strange but magnificent creature. It was serpentine and had flukes or wings and seemed to be lifted upon billowing sacs of air. It glided upon the air as if it were not the stone-being that it was. Link spurred his mare to pursue it.

He watched the Colossus for a long time. He was familiar with dragons. One he'd faced before in the other time moved in a way not dissimilar from the way this one sailed the desert wind. Link noticed that the Colossus made no move to attack him. After having fought so many highly aggressive beasts of late, this surprised him. "Phalanx" seemed to just want to glide over its desert and seemed to be waiting for him to simply go away.

An image came to Link's mind of Volvagia gliding over the live magma of the Fire Temple. Link shook his head vigorously. Epona galloped on, pulling herself up beneath the graceful flying creature.

Volvagia… had not been a peaceful dragon, but it had been his. Link remembered the little dragonlet he'd bought at the market in Castle Town, just for the sake of freeing it. Dragons were not to be kept in cages and its eyes had looked so sad. Unfortunately, the creature had a habit of biting and spiting fire at him, but it had imprinted on him. Link did his best to care for his scaly little friend. It had even learned to call to him by name. Volvagia had followed him around up until the point he'd been sealed into his seven years' sleep. After that, he'd found the thing full-grown, a flying serpent, raging in the heart of Death Mountain, threatening to eat an entire race of generally peaceful people.

The dragon had been under a powerful enchantment by Ganondorf. An ancient dragon-spirit, an erstwhile adversary of the Goron people had been awakened within it. Whether it was a genetic memory or some other spell, the Hero of Time had not known. Link's former pet had been essentially possessed and, in the end, the only way to save the Gorons was for Link to become a dragonslayer. Once beheaded, the head, for a few precious minutes, retained consciousness and looked up to Link in recognition. Volvagia had called his name once more before dying.

He had no idea if Volvagia was still alive somewhere in this timeline.

Once again, Link was facing a dragon that he did not want to kill. Phalanx was the thirteenth sacrifice. He had to make the sacrifice to move on to complete the ritual. The hairy stone drifter did nothing at all to him. It seemed to be trying to fly away. Link grit his teeth and aimed an arrow for one of its air sacs. The spray of black blood over his head told him that he'd done injury to the Colossus.

He aimed for the others and missed several times before he forced the creature to dive. Expecting it to crash-land upon the sands, he steered Epona away hard, only to see the great being lower its four front flukes and drag them in the dust, a picture of wounded elegance. Epona turned around and charged up alongside the beast, close to the trailing "wings."

Link leapt off her and grabbed a hold. He climbed up in little hops, finding purchase upon the bony-looking flukes in much the same way as he'd ascended parts of Dormin's Tower. The wings straightened out as the creature re-inflated its air sacs and rose. It still made no move to harm the young warrior. Link leapt aboard and ran along it to find its seals. The first stab brought tears wincing out of his eyes. He almost sliced through the hand with which he was grabbing the Colossus' shaggy fur because he'd closed his eyes while doing the deed.

"I'm sorry, Volvagia," he said when he'd really meant to say "I'm sorry, Phalanx."

He managed to stay on as the Phalanx made the one move it used to defend itself – a barrel-roll. Spinning head over tail made Link feel ill. He held on tightly and saw the ride through.

He looked at the second seal as he butchered it clean. Memories came to him of the purring baby dragon he'd once known and of that great head, pleading to him in pain, not understanding why he'd had to inflict it, or why it was dying.

Link did not quite get to the third seal upon Phalanx's great body before it slithered under the sands once again. It re-emerged and the painful chase dragged on. Once again, Link shot the creature down, jumped up one of it's flukes and ran down the body of a furred serpent, past the black oil geysers he'd caused. One more session with the final seal brought the giant down. Link leapt away from the body when he'd gotten within a range of the ground that would not hurt him. He tucked and rolled and watched the sandy crash.

He just stood and stared, waiting for the black threads to come to him. "Link…" he whispered, remembering Volvagia's last words, "It hurts…"

* * *

_**The warrior rides toward the final stage… **_


	7. Ghosts of the Gray Lands

**TO THE ANCIENT LAND**

**Chapter Seven: Ghosts of the Gray Lands**

Cenobia was a speedy hound he'd faced in a destroyed city. Link had ducked and dodged behind great pillars that had been tumbled to the ground long before he'd arrived, overgrown with moss. Everything looked like it had been destroyed already and there was no way to crack the Colossus' armor. There were no cliffs to fall from and everything that looked like it could have been toppled upon the beast was already one with the ground. Link had managed to hookshot his way onto a big, vaguely square-shaped central tower. From there, he'd dropped a few bombs onto Cenobia – this only made it angry. In a fit of inspiration, he tied a few bombs to a few arrows to make explosive arrows to shoot at its armored back. Again, this only succeeded in angering the creature.

Link managed to find a square of loose stone plaza-roof to taunt his prey to slam into and that had done what was needed to expose its seal. Link had been a little quicker and more wary than he had been with Celosia, - with which he'd compared Cenobia's size and speed.

Argus had been a little more standard – in that it had reminded the young Hylian warrior of his first battles in these lands. It was a big, lumbering sentry that he'd managed to leap upon from a broken bridge in something that resembled a grand outdoor plaza. One of its seals had been hidden in an interesting way, but it had fallen easy and it had fallen hard.

Link rode across the Green Cape. The Forbidden Lands were gray lands, cursed lands, but they were also very beautiful, especially in places like this. He was right at the southern end of the country, near the sea. He could smell the salt from the ocean carried upon the wind. The young man presented the Master Sword and the light that shone from it to an enormous gate with a circular seal. Once the seal was broken and the gate parted, Link found one last shrine to rest at before proceeding to chase the light.

This was the final one – the last idol in Dormin's Temple. The Dormin said that this was the last Colossus standing between life and death for his Zelda. The light glancing off the sword shone up and in. Link investigated its direction. He was sure he could hookshot over, but the gap above the river was too far a leap for his horse, even with her great physical ability.

"Well, Epona," he said, "This looks like the end of the line." He patted her neck and began un-cinching her saddle. "I've left you before, but this time… I don't know if I'm coming back."

He glanced up at the skies behind him, which looked threatening. They were a darker gray than the skies in the rest of this strange land. He hefted the saddle off his horse and placed it neatly on the ground. He folded the saddle-blanket and put it next to it. He didn't usually use a bit and reins with his mare, having her trained to leg-signals. She seemed to be able to detect his moods and his mind, anyway. For his part, Link knew that she was worried about him. She pawed the ground and tossed her head like she did when she was nervous or impatient. He could sense no danger here.

This reminded him of times in Hyrule when he'd had to leave her as he went to clear one temple or another of evil presences. He'd usually left her saddled; figuring that if he didn't come back, the mare would eventually go find Malon. He was sure a lonely Epona would wander back to the ranch where she was raised, because, according to Malon, she often had. Here in the Forbidden Lands, all of the times he'd left her, he'd planned on coming back. He'd known the danger he was in, but Epona left alone was one of his reasons for fighting hard to survive and return. He had not trust in the disembodied Dormin to protect her – or to care to, even if they could.

However, Link felt that now was truly the end of the line. He could not ignore the decay of his body or of his soul. He was sure that even if he won the fight, he would be consumed by the shadows. Perhaps his life-energy would be given in exchange for Zelda's. He knew the ending to the story he was told by the Elder in the Village of Horned Men. The young man of the ancient time had been consumed, overwhelmed… possessed. That one had also been given life-anew, according to the old tale, but that was only because of an intervention by others. Link had no others following him that he knew of. He could imagine Impa tailing him, but since this land seemed to exist outside of Time, he did not know if he'd "been gone long enough for her to notice" back on Hyrule's time-flow.

The Master Sword was obeying him. It was not a sword of seals that any priest or Sage could manipulate. It was his sword. It was probably more his now than it had ever been, since he had argued its spirit into obeying his hand, even as he used it against its purpose. He could not see the sword turning him into an infant. Even with that as a possibility, he knew that this was goodbye between him and Epona. Without her equipment, she could be comfortable and live free, running across the countryside, living on the rich grasses and drinking from the scattered pools. She might even find a way out of the Forbidden Lands someday, but, all in all, from what he had seen of the country, it wasn't bad country at all for wild horses.

Perhaps, when Zelda revived and awoke, she'd find Epona waiting to take her home even if he was gone in body, mind or both.

Link brought the mare's forehead to his own. "I'm sorry, girl," he whispered. "Find a good life, okay?" He moved toward her hindquarters and gave her a swift slap on the rump to send her back the way they had come. She galloped out of the seal-gate and out into the Green Cape.

Link looked to the other end of the chasm and up, to the place where he was to go to face his destiny. Sure enough, he did manage to get himself across without the use of his poor horse. As he stood on the chasm-cliff, he thought he saw something very strange. He looked again and saw a young man standing atop the edge of a wall, by circular pillars. The sky had grown angrier and much darker. Link was almost knocked over by the wind and he wondered how the other man could stand so still.

He also wondered at the other man's horns. The stranger resembled the people in the Horned Village. He had two long, proud horns like those of a wild ox, longer than any of what the men of the village had sported. As Link approached him, full of questions, he saw the man's sad gaze, his elaborately decorated cloak, dark rust-colored hair and his transparency. He was translucent, which meant that he was not entirely real in this world. An apparition. A ghost.

"The final Colossus is Malus," he said.

Link scratched his hair and blinked. Was this how he had known the names of those he'd killed?

"H-how do you know?" Link asked the spirit.

"I've been down this path before," the horned figure said before vanishing.

Link climbed up one of the large pillars and found himself buffeted by a tempest. He saw a dark land over which was scattered old arrow-ports, as for an army defending its coast. The Colossus rose up before him, up, and up and up. The creature looked like a tower. It glared at him before letting fly with a bolt of magical lightning from the glowing manacle on one of its wrists.

* * *

Epona galloped. She slowed down to a trot and then to a walk when she tired. She leaned her head to the ground and bit off a clump of grass to chew. She looked back toward the crag of rock where she had left her master. She knew that she could not follow him. Anxious, she pawed the ground and kept her ears pinned back toward the crag, hoping to hear what was going on. She listened diligently for her song. If her boy played her song, it meant that he needed her.

All she could do now was to rest and to eat a little. A sound and the scent of another mare caught her attention. To most humans, horses smell of sweet grass, of sweat, and perhaps of manure. People who work with horses can grow to adore their unique aroma. Horses, themselves, could smell something much more complex than any human could detect. The scent that stung Epona's nostrils was faded and had a hint of death to it – not the decay of flesh, but a kind of cold scent - like the smell of an autumn forest.

Her nose shot up from the grass and her ears swung to the whickering she heard. The black mare was back. It stood staring at her from the top of a gentle rise. Epona knew that this other horse was not completely a part of her world. It had been, once, but that time had passed long ago.

"_Follow,"_ the black horse commanded.

"_I cannot,"_ Epona whickered back, stamping a hoof in warning. _"I need to be ready for my master." _

"_Where he has gone you cannot follow,"_ the other horse signaled with subtle cues that only another horse could pick up on – motions of the head, a flick of the tail.

"_Don't you think I know that?"_ Epona stamped and pawed, showing her upset. She turned around and tried to ignore the black mare – a failing task as horses were herding animals by nature and nothing held their attention like another horse, even one they did not particularly care for.

"_I have been down this path before,"_ the black specter whinnied, demanding and commanding Epona's attention. _"If you follow me, you will find your master! He shall return to the central-place and you will find him there!"_

"_I will find him there?"_ Epona asked with a soft and curious "Bhurr."

"_Yes!"_ the black horse stamped. _"Follow me."_

With that, the black horse took off in a gallop. Epona followed at a full run. _"To my master!"_ she cried in the speech of horses, _"To my master!"_

* * *

"To the end of this!" Link growled to himself as he ran down a corridor, having barely dodged bolts of percussive, shining death. He came up by what looked like an armor "skirt" upon the man-like Colossus. He wondered why it was affixed. He wondered about it as he climbed – about the spirit of the young man he'd met along the way – if he was the figure of the Horned Village's legend. He wondered about the tower's re-animation from the time after that ancient time. Link even wondered if the sacrifices in this land were constant: Someone enters the land to destroy the sundered Colossi and unseal Dormin, only for him to be inevitably sealed by a person or a spell again, scattering out his energies to the Colossi, which, again are given in sacrifice to rescue some beloved soul.

Link also thought of Zelda, reminding himself of her. Otherwise, he had no idea why he would want to destroy such beautiful architecture. As he climbed the tower that was Malus, he found it magnificent. It was just a beautiful thing, finer than any of the towers of Hyrule Castle and he was ashamed of himself for allowing that thought to enter his mind.

The beast proved more complicated to slay than the others. The height was dizzying as Link leapt from hairy hand to hairy hand. The creature looked particularly perplexed as he crawled about on the back of one and then the other. Malus had to know what Link was here for – with the fierce magical bolts lobbed at him before. The Hylian's heart was in as much turmoil as the skies were. Victory was at hand and this one was truly a kill-or-be-killed matter, for this Colossus had displayed an active malice. It was not unlike the battle with Celosia, save for the key factor that the cat-like living hill had been able to move, and to move quickly. Link felt strange and just a little sad challenging a creature which had feet rooted into the earth.

Malus would shake and turn its hands around, but it almost seemed like it wasn't even trying. It knew its death was upon it and it wasn't even trying, in earnest, to stave it off anymore. It had tired at a distance, but was unable to fire off its defenses with the flea on its fur. Link shot an arrow into its shoulder and leapt for it when the great tower moved to scratch at the wound.

This was like torturing a beast in a cage – a vicious beast, but caged, nonetheless.

Malus fought harder once Link had found the seal atop its head. He struggled to stay aboard. A few jabs. A ride like riding a wild bull. Another stab. Sweat-slicked hands nearly lost their grip. Instant death from crushed bones lay below. A good, solid thrust fit to split a skull. Relaxation of both man and beast in a deep, long sigh. The tower cracked and groaned as Link remained upon it.

It was over. It was done. The ritual was complete. Link knew that he was still alive.

He wondered if that was a good thing or a bad thing.

* * *

_**The ritual has met its demise… The story isn't over… **_


	8. What Have You Done?

**TO THE ANCIENT LAND**

**Chapter Eight: What Have You Done? **

The great hall of Dormin's Tower was silent as threads of black shadow laid a body gently upon the stone-tile floor. The lovely queen lay still upon the altar. The Master Sword spun and struck itself through the stone-brick between the altar and the young man. His skin was gray and run-through with hairline fissures. His eyes were clouded and stared blankly as he pulled himself to his feet. They shone red, like those of his dark half had in another age. His hair had gone black. Just behind his ears, the buddings of horns began to grow.

Link, or the being that was once "Link" reached out. He pulled himself toward Zelda and toward his sword. The sword's hilt emitted a magical energy like sparks of electricity and it glowed slightly at its sharp edges the same way it used to in Hyrule when it neared evil beings.

Smokemen were everywhere. The shades ran toward the young man and poured into him. Link grunted and moaned. He felt the muscles of his body stretch against the faming of his bones and his skin twisting in unnatural ways. The once-hero felt himself fading as he could sense the dead spirits taking over, twisting him into something he was not and trying to consume him. His heart was becoming nothing but black smoke. He struggled against them, willing his dead-fleshed feet to step toward the altar, toward Zelda.

He reached for her as clouds of shadow billowed about him. Suddenly, a golden light shot out from the back of his left hand. Three golden triangles glowed through his torn leather gauntlet, making the shadows flee. They dispersed from him in a strange pattern, twisting his skin, his bones and his organs. Link screamed until the scream turned inhuman. His voice turned to howls and low moans. The voices of the Dormin screeched as if they were people who'd been burnt with a hot branding iron. The black shadow erupted into a fount of oil and smoke that vanished, leaving in their wake the worst of what they could do to the body of a grieving Hylian protected by a relic belonging to gods.

The Triforce of Courage had stayed with Link. It had tried to protect him, despite all that he had done. It had certainly taken courage to face dangerous beasts of awe. Courage had always been a neutral virtue – it usually existed for the good, but was not always good in and of itself. The actions of a hero take courage, but so, too, do the actions of many a murderer. The Triforce, however, even in fragments, had always borne a basis in good, save for the corruption inherent in the fragment of Power among those unbalanced in heart. The Triforce had attempted to save Link. His soul was kept from consumption. His body was another matter.

* * *

Doves landed on the stone by Zelda's altar and took off.

Epona stamped a hoof, waiting by one of the stairways outside. She had found her way all the way back here, alone – but not entirely. The ghost of the black mare she had chased had disappeared as soon as she had found a familiar path.

Slowly, Zelda's chest rose. One breath. Two breaths. Her eyes fluttered open. Stiff and strange, she sat up. She was aware of her blood coursing and her skin becoming warm in the light of the sun.

She shook her head and rubbed her temples. Had she been dreaming? No… she was dead. She had the memories of dreams. Spectral visions came back to her. "Oh no…" she said.

She feared turning around. The young queen felt like herself. Her fragment of the Triforce, that of Wisdom, glowed softly upon the back of her hand. She did not sense any corruption within her spirit. She was whole – wrenched from one world back to another. She'd never noticed before how weighty a body was, nor the many tiny aches and pains that pin-pricked her as she caught her breath and her bearings. She had no idea what had happened to the entity or entities that had joined her back to her body and had, apparently, staved off her decay.

Zelda did not want to see the sacrifice her knight had made for her. If he lay behind her dead, she could not bear it. If he lay behind her in some worse state, she did not know if she could keep her mind together. She gathered up courage within her, the trait that he was known for and turned around as she stepped off the altar.

"Oh, Link," she gasped. "What have you done to yourself?"

Link moaned, a sorrowful sound and the only kind that he could make. He regarded the Lady Zelda with pained blue eyes – somehow sadder than the ones he'd always had. He reached out an enormous hand, facing it palm-up so that she might step out upon it.

"Link…"

He lifted her up to meet his stone mask of a face. Link had taken on a form resembling the shape of a wolf. His forefeet, however, were as human forearms with great hands.

A mane-like flourish protruded from behind the stone horns that had replaced his once-proud Hylian ears. The long structure resembled the hat he'd worn in human-form. He was covered in greenish skin like concrete, dressed in stone armor and patches of thick blond hair. Parts of his body glowed as seals, the most prominent one having the mark of the Triforce as its center. He could barely fit in the space within the tower.

The newly-minted Colossus brought the young woman up to its stone snout and regarded her with a groan. Zelda wept and threw her arms around one of the decorated stone structures making up the "nose."

"Why, Link?" she sobbed. "You should have left me be! I warned you! I remember now that I warned you!"

She received a sad grunt in response and the light went out in his eyes. The mask-like structure darkened for a moment, before the sad blue eyes resurfaced. It was all he could do to manage a blink. His limited expression conveyed that he still had the mind of a man. He could understand her, but he was trapped in the body of a beast – a thinking soul inside a statue.

"You can never leave this place, can you?" Zelda asked, shaking her head.

Link looked up for a moment, his gaze out upon the wide world made of the Forbidden Lands. He turned back to her and she planted a tender kiss upon one of the smooth areas of his snout. The Colossus lowered his hand to set her down, moaning and shaking his great head. He was trying to express some grief-filled message, but he was incoherent.

Epona ascended the steps and walked up to her, nuzzling the young woman. The horse looked to the Colossus in the room, unafraid. "She'll… take me home?" Zelda asked. "She knows the way, doesn't she?"

Link did the best nod he could. His hair-trimmed "hat" undulated up and down with the movement.

"I am so sorry," Zelda said. "It appears I have done you evil yet again."

Link moaned, doing his best to shake his head in a negative.

"I never asked this of you, yet you persisted. And now… what have you done? Link, what have you done?"

He pawed his face with his giant palm and groaned as if he was trying to come up with a way to vent his very soul.

Zelda grabbed the Master Sword – a thing she could not wield in battle but could touch – and mounted Epona, arranging her skirts in a way to make her comfortable for a long ride without a saddle. She looked up at her former knight. "I will make sure that Hyrule remembers you as a Hero," she said, letting one last tear drip down her cheek before letting Epona take her out of the temple.

She stared ahead, over the empty land as the mare plodded along, following the broken bridge to the place where her memory told her she'd come in. Zelda patted her neck. "He'll be a part of this land, won't he?" she said to the horse, not expecting to be understood, talking to herself. "His soul will not be free until it is set free… but by whom? Will the suffering in these cursed lands just cycle back again?"

As the horse ascended the path out of the lands-that-were-not-supposed-to-exist, Zelda heard a low howl. It was like that of a wolf, but heavier. She looked back to see the shadow of a great stone beast shamble off beyond the tower in the empty lands beyond.

She would make sure that her kingdom remembered him only as a Hero. He had given his life for hers in a mysterious place where terrible miracles happened. Hyrule would know no other legend.

* * *

**END. **


End file.
